i gotta feeling...

that tonight's gonna be a good night.

Black Eyed Peas hit the nail on the head. being mary's favorite band (yes i think it's weird. but you try changing the song whenever BEP comes on and you are in for an earful of mary's yelling). It's halloween and we are so very excited. mary already made an appearance at work in her Fufa costume, which everyone loved. and i was half dressed in my boombox outfit (sans box since it won't fit through doorways). brent is working right now, but he's getting off early so we can wander around the neighborhood getting candy that mary will eat (and probably us too, i won't lie). so you'll have to wait until tomorrow at the earliest for some awesome pictures of the greatest yo gabba gabba (YGG) family you've ever seen.

in the meantime, feel free to ooh and ahh over our pumpkin carving skills (or in the case of mary, painting skills):

blogger is being a bit basic and not letting me move around the pictures. so they are kind of out of order. oh well. you get it. mary painted. brent and i carved. mine is the owl, brent's the bat and jack o lanter, and mary's the painted goodness.

i tried to post a video of mary dancing to the BEP song mentioned in the title but it won't upload. curse you blogger *shakes fist* i'll try again later!

happy, happy birthday, mary dear

happy days will come to you all year.

if i had a wish then it would be:

a happy, happy birthday to you from me!

monday was mary's 2nd birthday. the terrible twos started out...well not terrible, but not as planned. that's for sure.

the day dawned bright and warm, despite the weather calling for rain later. after a breakfast of cupcakes and some barney watching, we got moving on birthday festivities. first on the list? cornbelly's. we get there and the lot is completely empty. Brent kept saying, "i think it's closed." to which i replied, "how can it be closed?" because really, does it make sense that it would be closed at noon? of course not.

too bad it was really closed.

seems cornbelly's doesn't open until 4 pm on weekdays. what is that nonsense? i mean really, why wait until 4 pm when the little ones want to take advantage of early day sunshine and warmth? *sigh* we took some time to snap a few shots of mary since they had a big sign on one barrel of hay about birthday girl parking.

sometimes i wish we could just have a professional photographer follow us around so that there wouldn't be several of the same shots, just with different parents standing with mary...:
mary was captivated by the candles for some reason

then we moved on to pumpkin pictures. mary was already getting restless at this point. and the dainty behind that emits gases like a grown man did not want to touch the hay. i just love how she picks and chooses when to be a girl.

mary's new fascination moved to rocks. and since the entire ground was gravel city, she kept bending over to add to her collection (which i somehow convinced her to leave there)after the picture taking, gma koz and uncle ty-ty met up with us for lunch at the cafe at thanksgiving point and a quick tour of the dinosaur museum (which is kind of expensive fyi). we vowed to come back after 4 and play at cornbelly's because it all looked so awesome.

mary was super tired by this point and unfortunately fell asleep on the car ride home. that means no napping. because for some insane reason mary thinks a quick 20 minute nap is sufficient. you're not a cat mary. no cat naps. we tried to get her to go back down for a real nap once at home. she kept jabbering away, until eventually falling asleep. only to wake up about 45 minutes later. i kept thinking of that one disneyland/world commercial with the little boy, "i'm too excited to sleep." that's our mary. too excited.

during her nap i had a mini melt down of sorts over her cake. see, i decided to take on a rather large challenge and use fondant...for the first time ever. to explain accurately, i need to go back a bit:

kara let me peruse her book of recipes that turn boxed mix cakes from drab to fab. i chose a rather simple chocolate cake, made tastier with the aid of chocolate pudding and chocolate chips (mary likes chocolate like her mommy). and then decided to go that extra mile (as if i wasn't already) and make a banana filling for it. oh em gee, i took a little nibble and it was good. if i do say so myself. all of sunday i spent actually making the cake while brent was away dealing with car fail (more on that later). anyway, i got the fondant on easier than i thought, especially considering lack of "proper" tools and knowledge. i chose which colors i wanted and how i wanted to design it and went to work. it was all done, except i needed to "finish the seams" or clean up the bottoms of each tier, or however you say that more succinctly. in hindsight, i should've done that first. i was in such a hurry. i told myself, i'll go get the rest of the supplies on monday morning to fix it.

well, monday morning came and went. i was planning on going during mary's nap, which proved to be non existent. so as i was rushing to the store to buy some premade icing and be done with it, i accidentally picked up red that looked pink on the front. and of course i didn't notice until i got home. ugh. ugh. ugh. i had to improvise. i wasn't happy. i freaked out. brent tried to console but really, at this point i am inconsolable. i just am. this is why i try to stay away from any kind of crafty thing. i am, in the words of somebody on the cable guy movie i've never seen but hear brent quote all the time (sorry run on), perfectionish...perfectionish...perfectionist (this will make little sense if you haven't seen the movie. i apologize for the lame quote). anyway, see for yourself. ladies at work were very nice about it. i almost want to make the picture super tiny so you can't see it well.

it really wasn't supposed to look that bad. it was supposed to be awesome. awesome as in, "we at foodnetwork love your cake so much we want to give you a show all about making them." okay, so not really.

when mary "woke up" we headed out to lehi for cornbelly's. again. we get there and guess what? it starts raining. and the temp dropped. i was so MAD. because it looked so fun and mary would've had a blast. and i missed out on so many photo ops. can you imagine the cuteness that is mary playing in a cornmaze? oh well.

off to pirate island...only mary fell asleep. and we were running late for cake, though some people that we planned on weren't able to make it anyway...so we decided to just order some pizza and do pirate island later, when we'd have more time to enjoy it. alas, no yars from mary that day.

when we got home, brent asked me, "is it ok to pull out the b-u-b-b-l-e-s since it's mary's birthday?" you dont' mention bubbles unless you expect mary to play with them for hours. pretty sure she learned that from cous brendan or something. but being her special day, how could i say no?

then it was cake time. mary was feeling a bit overwhelmed. too much pressure to perform while we all sang:she got over it when presents appeared

mary didn't want to stop playing with toys in order to eat cake. she was enthralled with the kitchen set from gpas koz. she did take a few bites, though only after being allowed to use her new plate and flatware first. tomorrow mary and i are gonna go pick something nice out thanks to gpas lub. they insisted i get her something she wants and not needs. but mary wants everything. how do we narrow it down? it should be a good time all around.

um...this has gotten completely too long. so i'll explain car fail on a later date. besides, i dont' want to taint mary's bday post. just know that brent's car is dead and gone. may it RIP. thanks to all who wished mary a happy birthday and gave her cute little loves in any form. she thanks you, and so do we :)

this is completely random. but you need to watch it. like right now. quite literally the best thing ever. you'll thank me later.
kittens inspired by kittens

did you know...

that monday is mary's 2nd birthday? *gasp* i can't believe it either. i mean, seriously, i cannot believe it. wasn't it just yesterday she turned one? and then a few weeks before that she was so tiny brent could have her resting in just one arm? remember when she was smaller than tiggy (though admittedly, that's not so difficult with our cat)? well, alas, she is a toddler now. she's so stinkin big and full of girly attitude (that's not a good thing), wanting to be 16 before she can fully talk...

*sigh*

so in case any of you were wondering, mary saw something she really wants:

just kidding. that's a kindle, and consequently, what i want. for christmas, birthday, just because...ahem.

seriously though, what mary wants is this:

Yo Gabba Gabba toddler bedding!!

or

Yo Gabba Gabba soundtrack (i even entered a contest through gabbafriends...wow i'm awesome)

in other news, stacey and kyle had their baby on wednesday; londyn faith kozlowski is among us. and mary is not happy about it. upon holding the tiny bundle of joy, mary's face scrunched up in the most tragic face you've ever seen. she was also emitting what sounded like whimpers, all while huge, fat tears ran down her face. i gave londyn back to stacey, much to the relief of mary. when i suggested i hold the baby again, mary shook her head profusely and climbed on my lap. if i tried to get up, she'd pull me back onto the couch and climb over me again. cute but troublesome at the same time. she's made known that another baby is not welcome in the near future.

londyn is doing well. she looks like her daddy. apparently the kozlowski gene is strong. very strong. and stacey and kyle have never looked happier. i know londyn will bring them so much joy! and mary will for sure keep the tiny one in check. :)

sorry this doesn't have any "real" pictures. but monday, depending on how my cake works out, there will be shots of that. and, if weather permits, you should be seeing some concerning mary's bday trip to Cornbelly's and Pirate Island. argggg she's gonna have a great birthday!

kitchen warrior

i know, i know, i know. i suck. in my defense...ok so i don't have one. still, i'm sorry. to make up for my lack of updating, may i present: "Cake Pops: the making of"

i don't know if any of you are familiar with bakerella's blog. but she has these amazing cake pops that i have been admiring for awhile. i bought a ton of materials in order to make them back...oh man, awhile ago. i had every intention of doing eggs for easter but time got away from me. halloween, though, happens to be the ideal time for my creative attempts in the kitchen.

so, it all started with baking the cake, letting it cool, crumbling it up and adding a jar of frosting. when i do this again, i dont' think i'll use the entire jar as it seemed a bit too mushy. the mixture gets cooled in the fridge until it firms up, shaped then put in the freezer to harden. when that's complete you get lollipop sticks, dip them in melted chocolate, and stick them in the balls. i wish i had taken pics of each step. but honestly, my hands were covered in cake goop so it wasn't really a possibility.

i actually made balls for pumpkins and...i guess bell shapes? for ghosts. plus i had white and orange melting chocolate to use. so...the white chocolate somehow melted in the pantry and rehardened. that made remelting it a pain and not as smooth. so much so that the ghosts fell apart in the chocolate. i am retrying those tomorrow. the pumpkins stood up better. but again, i think i used too much frosting so they started to soften a bit too much in the hot chocolate. observe:

once i got the hang of things, the pumpkins looked better. though i still got some funky looking ones. and i couldn't find an edible pen in any of the stores that sold baking supplies...which made decorating the face a bit challenging. what do you think?

BOO!

mary really liked helping. in fact, she was very adament about yelling "HOT" whenever i stirred the chocolate. such a little helper. and i'm pretty sure she was hoping to eat something. i know brent was. he got all my rejects, as in the crappy ones that i threw in the cake pan. mary really enjoyed carrying around the cake pops, modeling them for the camera:

and for those of you in the pharmacy who read this: um, well, i'm gonna have to bring them in on thurs. i need to do another batch because i'm pretty sure only 1/2 of the ones i made are good enough to give away to people!